Grüne on equality and diversity

The Greens want diversity and anti-discrimination to be part of school culture, school bodies, teaching and classroom materials. Curricula would be revised with a view to diversity and gender equity, and queer topics would become part of the curriculum.

The Greens want schools to embrace diversity. No one should be treated unfairly. Every school should have a contact person for this. Queer topics should also be taught in class.

Each school would name a contact person for diversity and anti-discrimination, backed by a state-level advisory office staffed with experts. The concept follows a state anti-discrimination law that the Greens are calling for. The education project SCHLAU Niedersachsen would continue to receive funding, along with contact persons for LGBTIQ issues. Gender stereotypes in career choices would be reduced through revised career guidance and early support for girls and women in STEM subjects.

The Greens want women in academia to have the same career opportunities as men. The platform notes that women make up half of students and doctoral candidates but hold far fewer professorships and leadership posts.

There are few female professors at universities. The Greens want to change that. Women should have the same chances as men. Secure jobs and child care should help.

Above all, the step from doctorate to professorship should become easier. The results of a dialogue initiative on a gender-equitable university culture are to be made more binding and receive funding. The platform names the difficulty of combining starting a family with an academic career as an obstacle. The Greens' answer is secure employment, adequately funded workplace child care and firm prospects of staying on.

The Greens are seeking a treaty with the Islamic religious communities to put matters such as religious education, imam training and pastoral care on a new footing. The umbrella organizations of Sinti and Roma are also to receive contractually guaranteed recognition and funding.

The Greens want a treaty with the Islamic communities. It would cover things like religion classes and training for imams. The Sinti and Roma associations should also get a treaty. The state should fund them for the long term.

Interfaith dialogue is to receive continued support. The program also plans cooperation with other religious communities, such as Alevi and Yazidi congregations. Minority languages such as Romani are to be specifically supported. Funding cuts for civil society associations, such as those of Sinti and Roma, are to be reversed.

The Greens want to create an anti-discrimination law for Lower Saxony modeled on Berlin's. It is meant to protect against discrimination by state and municipal agencies and institutions and, for the first time, give those affected a claim to compensation.

The Greens want a new law against unfair treatment. It should apply to offices of the state and the towns. People affected can then ask for money as compensation. There should be complaint offices everywhere.

The law is meant to close gaps in legal protection between the federal General Equal Treatment Act and Lower Saxony's equal rights law. Those affected should find it easier to act against discrimination and to claim damages. A network of local complaint offices is planned that is easy to reach, multilingual and low-barrier. Much like data protection officers, these offices are to give advice and represent affected people in dealings with public agencies. The law is also meant to give queer people better protection.

The Greens want queer orientations and identities to be recognized as a natural part of society. To that end they plan counseling and support networks, especially in rural areas, more education in schools, and queer-sensitive practices and gender-inclusive language in state agencies.

Queer people should belong everywhere in Lower Saxony. Queer means lesbian, gay or trans, for example. The Greens want more counseling, especially in rural areas. Schools should talk openly about diversity. State offices should use gender-inclusive language.

The plan includes statewide counseling for trans, intersex and nonbinary people and for families with genderqueer children, plus a contact point for victims of anti-queer violence and more targeted prosecution. In schools, gender identity and sexual orientation are to be covered outside sex education as well, teacher training is to include the topic, and physical education is to be mixed more often. All-gender restrooms as single stalls are planned, including in public buildings. The state's coat of arms law and flag decree are to be changed so the rainbow flag can be flown more easily. Health care, services for older queer people, youth work, sports, and self-help and advocacy groups are to get stronger and lasting funding.

The Greens want to fully implement the Istanbul Convention on protecting women from violence and launch a cross-ministry overall strategy for violence protection. This includes more places in women's shelters, reliable public funding for them and an expansion of counseling centers.

Many women experience violence. The Greens want to protect them better. There should be more places in women's shelters. The places should be free for the women. Counseling centers should also get more money.

Women's shelters are to meet minimum standards for facilities and be funded regardless of occupancy; children who come along are also to be taken into account. Additional safe houses are planned for refugee women, and specially protected, for example anonymous, admission for women without secure residence status. Cooperation with landlords and housing cooperatives is meant to help women find a home quickly afterward. The coordination office of the counseling centers for women and girls is to receive permanent funding again, and a new office is to coordinate implementation of the convention. Enough psychotherapy places for aftercare are also to be created, and the particular situation of migrant women, women with disabilities or homeless women, among others, is to be considered.

The Greens are seeking an election law reform that provides for gender parity and holds up constitutionally. It is meant to raise the share of women in the state parliament and local councils, which stood at 27 percent in the state parliament after the last election.

There are far more men than women in the state parliament. Only about one in four members is a woman. The Greens want to change the election law. Then more women should sit in the parliament and in local councils.

The platform notes that women and inter*, trans* and non-binary people are heavily underrepresented in parliaments and local bodies. Key political decisions are still mostly made by men, it says. The reform is to be designed so that it withstands constitutional review.

The Greens want to tighten Lower Saxony's Equal Rights Act so that more women hold leadership roles in the public service. In companies in which the state holds a stake, at least half of executive and supervisory board seats are to go to women.

Few women are bosses in the public service. The Greens want to change that with a stricter law. There should be a minimum share of women bosses. In companies owned by the state, half of the leaders should be women.

The plan includes a minimum share of women in leadership and a duty to advertise vacant posts publicly. All municipalities that do not belong to a Samtgemeinde (joint municipality), and the joint municipalities themselves, are to get a full-time equal opportunity officer. Minimum staffing standards are to apply to equal opportunity offices. Removing an equal opportunity officer is to be possible only under the same strict conditions as for elected municipal officials. The party wants at least half of the supervisory board seats filled by the state itself to go to women.